Madhu Knits and Cooks

A Mostly Instant Pot Rasam - A MadhuKnitsandCooks.com Success!

Rasam is a simple spiced South Indian vegan soup or broth.  It's one of my favorite accompaniments to Indian meals, though I haven't made it in some time.  Emboldened by our first trip to the local Indian grocery store in 6 months, I decided to try a more substantive rasam than my previous efforts.  

I turned to Saranya Mandava's Indian Cuisine cookbook, and decided to go with her "Rasam No. 2" recipe with a few modifications from my mother and utilizing the Everest rasam powder I purchased.  

The final result was excellent - perfectly spiced from the mustard seeds and rasam powder; tangy from the tomatoes and lemon juice; and substantive from the mashed moong dal.  I will be making this rasam recipe again and again!

And the best part?  Using the Instant Pot for most of the dish, which freed up the rest of my stovetop for other dishes I was preparing at the same time. 

My main recipe modifications were to cook the moong dal for 10 minutes on low pressure in the Instant Pot before mashing; using 2 tsp. of rasam powder, which I added to the rasam with the tomatoes; and omitting the grinding of the spices that had been tempered on the stovetop.  I instead just added them directly to the pot after cooking them on the stovetop in a small pan.

I also added 5 curry leaves, which I ripped in half, to the tempering spices, and I omitted the fenugreek seeds to the tadka because I couldn't find them in my pantry (did I throw them away?).  Finally, I used approx. juice from 1/4 lemon, which seemed to be enough.

A Fantastic Upma (Thanks Mom) - A Hearty Spiced Semolina Breakfast

Upma is a savory and hearty Indian breakfast dish, usually made with roasted dry semolina though I have made variants with quinoa and steel cut oats.  As it turns out, sometimes sticking to the original can produce the best results as my recent effort with ground semolina or sooji found.

I purchased the sooji, roasted so I didn't need to roast it at home, at our local Patel Brothers.  I followed Saranya Mandava's cookbook recipe with a few critical modifications from my mother.  

First was that I added fresh curry leaves (maybe 7 -8), which I ripped in half, to the cooking vegetables.  Second, I slightly reduced the oil to 5 - 6 tablespoons.  Third, I added the ginger toward the end of the onion / tomato / chile cooking time so that it wouldn't burn as the others cooked.

I also increased the salt to 1.25 tsp. and the water to 3 cups instead of the 1.5 - 2 called for in the recipe (semolina stayed the same at 1 cup).

Finally, after the semolina fully cooked after 3 - 4 minutes, I took the pan off the heat, stirred in juice from 1/4 fresh lemon and some diced cilantro.  I then let the upma stay covered for approx. 5 minutes before serving.

This finished upma was quickly consumed in our home.  The mixture was well-spiced from the mustard seeds and dals; tart from the lemon, tomato, and cilantro; slightly sweet from the ginger and semolina; and featured the unique deep flavor of the curry leaves.  Yum!

Brined Crispy Tofu - A Laborious But Delicious Tofu Preparation Method

For several months, I've wanted to try Cook's Illustrated "Better Fried Tofu" approach.  The method calls for brining raw tofu before tossing it in cornstarch for the lower fat pan-frying approach I enjoy.  CI reported that brining takes out more moisture from the tofu blocks, resulting in a crispier crust with a softer middle.

I paired this method with another CI recipe, published under their America's Test Kitchen brand.  The Crispy Tofu with Sweet Chili Sauce (Tianla Cuipi Doufu) recipe worked really well with the brining modification as it just added a bit more time to the recipe prep.  

I cut the tofu as instructed into large blocks to do the quick brining.

I then cut the pieces into smaller increments (approx. 3/4 inch cubes) before the coating in cornstarch, cornmeal, and some toasted sesame seeds that I happened to have on as well.  

I pan fried the tofu in two batches, using about 1/2 of the vegetable oil called for in the recipe.  That seemed to be enough - approx. 1/4 cup for the initial batch and then a few more tablespoons for the second batch.

And then before serving, I followed the instruction to put the tofu into a preheated, slightly warm oven on paper towels to get some of the oil out.

Finally, I made some modifications to the accompanying sauce based on personal preference and the comments section on the ATK site.  I used only 1 tbsp. of sugar and I slightly reduced the cornstarch as well.

The sauce had both a sharp vinegar flavor and a sweet undertone, making it slightly odd for dipping. 

The tofu by contrast was fantastic - crisp and slightly crunchy from the cornmeal coating, with a nice moist interior.  It was a great appetizer before our larger meal. 

I look forward to using this tofu approach again and again, and figuring out new ways to pair it with other meals!

Pati Jinich's Arroz Verde - An Unexpectedly Fantastic Spiced Rice

Pati Jinich, the delightful host of the PBS show Pati's Mexican Table, has created a number of recipes that I rely on, including her super easy Arroz Rojo.  Her red rice is so good that I never thought about venturing away to make her Arroz Verde or green rice recipe.  I came to it only when I had a single poblano pepper that I didn't know what to do with, and I happened upon that page of her Pati's Mexican Table cookbook.  

The recipe seemed easy enough for my somewhat lazy attitude that weekday evening.  Not only was it, but it also was unexpectedly fantastic - spicy from the poblano pepper, herby from the cilantro, and slightly sweet from the onion chunks.  

I halved the recipe, and used vegetable bouillon for the broth, but otherwise followed the directions as is.

Do yourself a favor and get Pati's Mexican Table as soon as you can!

A Modern Cook's Year Carrot Dhal - A Dressed Up Lentil Stew for Guests

I make a lot of dals or Indian lentils.  It's an easy way to insert protein into vegetarian meals, and I usually make enough to last for days.  When I saw a complicated Carrot Dhal recipe in the much-heralded Modern Cook's Year cookbook, I didn't think this recipe was for me.  Does one really need a dal that requires many steps, and a special accompanying pickle at that?  

Insert the obvious yes!  This recipe produced a fantastic dal, with incredibly complex flavors and textures - slightly sweet from the carrots, creamy from the coconut milk, deeply spiced from the ground and crushed spices, slight bitterness from the spinach, and the sharp, spiced tang of the accompanying radish pickle.  Amazing.  This is a dal to serve at a dinner party to wow your guests instead of having it be a mere humble, protein-rich side.

I did make a number of changes to the recipe, some intended and others inadvertent.  Starting with the latter, I used 3/4 cup of masoor dal and 1/4 cup of moong dal because I ran out of masoor dal, I substituted champagne vinegar for white wine vinegar, used Better than Bouillon for the broth, and used light coconut milk instead of its full fat equivalent.  On the intended changes, I used slightly less lemon zest (3/4 lemon) and juice (1/2 lemon), slightly less cilantro and green chile, and reduced the cooking water to 2 cups to produce a thicker dal, which worked out well.

I also found microplaning everything to be a bit of a pain, so ended up using the largest holes on a box grater for the carrots and just finely chopped the onion and chile, which was fine.

While the dal is cooking, whip up your radish pickle, and then serve together.  You won't regret the time spent to prepare this luscious dish!

Fuchsia Dunlop "Fish Fragrant" Eggplant - Eggplant Has Truly Found Its Way Into My Kitchen!

Who would have thought 8 years ago, or even 3 years ago, that I would have finally mastered cooking Sichuan eggplant (or any type of eggplant) at home?  But fresh off my May mastery of Sichuan eggplant, using the Omnivore's Cookbook eggplant preparation approach, I set off to find a better sauce because the last one was too sweet and thick.

A friend recommended the UK Sichuan cooking expert Fuchsia Dunlop's Fish Fragrant eggplant recipe, and I was able to cobble together pantry staples to produce an excellent eggplant dish.  The eggplant was spicy, sour, and just slightly sweet from the chile paste, vinegar, sugar, and spice mixture.  The green onions added a slight freshness to this dish as well - yum!

I made a few minor substitutions to the recipe - I reduced the sugar to 1 tsp. to avoid too sweet a dish, I substituted corn starch for the potato starch, and I used water + vegetarian Better than Bouillon for the chicken stock.  And of course, as mentioned above, I repeated the Omnivore's Cookbook usage of cornstarch to coat and cook the eggplant pieces instead of deep frying them.

After cooking the eggplant, which I did in 3 batches, I then quickly simmered the sauce down before adding in the eggplant.  The dish comes together quickly after the eggplant is cooked, so have your rice and other sides ready to eat immediately!

Moosewood Peruvian Quinoa Stew - Healthy Option for the Week

In an effort to break away from my library books, I browsed my cookbook shelf to find a cookbook that hasn't received a lot of love from me.  While scanning the titles, I was saddened that most of my cookbooks fall into that category.  Undaunted, I selected my Moosewood Cooks at Home book and found the Peruvian Quinoa Stew recipe.  With a new unopened bag of quinoa at home, this seemed like an obvious recipe to try.

The recipe was incredibly healthy - vegetables and ground spices - and very easy to prepare by using the Instant Pot to cook quinoa.  Amazingly, quinoa cooks perfectly in 1 minute at high pressure!

And I didn't need to use the oil recommended to coat the pot - no sticking occurred, similar to my omission of oil for my Instant Pot cooked steel cut oats.

As the quinoa was separately cooking, I built the stew base with the vegetables and spices.  I used a full Pomi chopped tomatoes box in the stew, so I had slightly more tomatoes (3 cups) than called for in the original recipe.

Unlike Indian recipes, you don't bloom the dried spices in the oil before adding the other ingredients, rather you add the spices when the vegetables go into the pot.  I was slightly worried that the spices wouldn't full blend into the soup using this method, but I was thankfully surprised by the result.  And a note for myself - I halved the coriander powder because of personal preference, and it worked out fine in the final dish.

The quinoa was great when served - incredibly tangy from the tomatoes; slightly sweet, sour and spicy from the spices; and very filling from all of the vegetables and quinoa.  The only downside of this dish is that I think it's meant more for a crowd (it comfortably serves 5 as a main course) or to eat over a week, versus the 2 days in which we quickly ate it up (and got a little sick of it).  I will be making this again and again, particularly in winter when it will help warm me on cold days.

Will I Have This Cookbook Forever? Madhur Jaffrey Instant Pot Gingery Tomato Chickpeas with Nigella Seeds

Nigella seeds are underutilized in our kitchen.  Originally purchased for a reason I don't remember, I seem to have used them only twice - for a Balaboosta crispy kale recipe and nan-e barbari. 

Yum, I should make nan-e barbari again.  

Moving to the present, with the Madhur Jaffrey Instantly Indian Cookbook trapped in my home due to our warranted public library shutdown, I had the opportunity to try her Chickpeas in a Gingery Tomato Sauce.  Without a doubt, the dish's best feature was the fragrant nigella seeds.  But the dish could have easily stood without them - that's how delicious this gingery, lightly acidic and velvety dish tasted.

Unlike most Instant Pot recipes, this was laborious in that Jaffrey calls for removing the chickpea skins before cooking them in the sauce.  I may omit this step the next time I make this dish.  I will also follow my standard soaked chickpeas Instant Pot cooking time - 12 minutes - instead of her 3 because the chickpeas were incredibly undercooked at 3 minutes.  

The other three modifications I made to the recipe were to 1) cook only 1/2 cup of chickpeas, which resulted in more than enough for 2 - 3 meals; 2) use leftover tomato pizza sauce for the ~1/3 cup of pureed tomatoes called for; 3) substitute lime juice for lemon because it's what I had at home.  Those recipes aren't necessary for future versions, but they worked well which points to the versatility of this recipe.

Two Madhur Jaffrey Instantly Indian Dishes - Muslim-Style Masoor Dal and South Indian-Style Green Beans

Not being able to return library books has meant that I've started to experiment with recipes I wouldn't otherwise try from Madhur Jaffrey's Instantly Indian Instant Pot Cookbook.  Both of the these recipes - Red Lentils Cooked in a Muslim Style and Green Beans Stir-Fried in a South Indian Style - seemed too simple to use a formal cookbook, but I would make them again.

I halved the Musalmani Masoor ingredients, and was able to quickly cook the dal in the Instant Pot while separately sautéing the onion, garlic and dried red chiles to add to the final, lightly mashed cooked dal.

The dal was lightly fragrant from the onion, chile and garlic, and a very simple dal to serve on the side of future meals.  

The beans I modified by omitting the Instant Pot entirely, and pre-cooking them in the original plastic package for 4 minutes before sautéing them on the stovetop with the required spices.  The beans were overcooked so in the future I will pre-cook them for 2 - 2.5 minutes.  They did have a lovely flavor from the mustard seeds, urad dal, and chile though, so it was a nice spice blend to repeat (omitting the lemon juice, which I didn't have).

Fourth Time's a Charm - A Sichuan Eggplant Success!

How I dread seeing raw eggplant.  It fills me with fear and sadness because I have never been able to successfully prepare it at home.

Cooked eggplant though I thoroughly enjoy seeing on my plates at restaurants and other's homes. 

I have tried, tried, and tried again to master eggplant at home, but each time resulted in failure or close to it. 

Well, past failures be darned!  When I saw some long eggplant at the grocery store recently I decided to be bold and try this dish again.

I decided to alter my approach, and followed an Omnivore's Cookbook recipe that called for coating the eggplant slivers with cornstarch before pan frying.

Similar to past recipes I've followed, prior to preparing the eggplant slices, soak the cut pieces in salt water to get rid of excess moisture.

Then pan fry the eggplant slivers until they are well-browned.  I almost stopped cooking the pieces when they had a facial browning on some sides, but the eggplant still tasted undercooked and tough.  I decided to keep them on the heat until they broke down more, resulting in a soft interior and crisper edges - approximately 10 minutes of cooking time.

Then using the same skillet, prepare the sauce before adding the eggplant back in.  

I largely followed the Omnivore's Cookbook sauce approach, which resulted in a cornstarch-heavy gloppy sauce and too much sauce for the reduced amount of eggplant I had (13 oz. compared to 16 oz. called for in recipe).  It was also a little sweet for my taste, though we added ground Sichuan peppercorn to the plated eggplant, which made it much better.  I will probably improvise my own sauce approach moving forward for this otherwise great eggplant dish!  Success at last!